Wednesday, June 22, 2005

Meet Donald, the lab mouse. He is just one example out of thousands - actually millions - of mice that give their lives daily in mankind's pursuit of better health. We'd be hypocrites if we said stop, because the live model - at least for now - is a necessary evil for providing critical health information to help millions of humans. To say we owe our lives, or at the very least our better health, to these little animals is an understatement.

We salute Donald and all other creatures large and small who have helped us by their sacrifices...

Wednesday, June 15, 2005

Mabel, the patriarch of our mouse clan, is getting old. That said, he is still very much the top mouse and gets treated thus. Daily he is held, stroked, petted, pampered and loved by Christopher and I. Recently, we found out he adores having his cheeks and chin gently stroked, and I swear he is smiling and goes into a kind of ecstacy as we do this. We have even witnessed his tale twitching up, then down, with each stroke. His little front paws with draw up in response, also. His fur is so soft, and he even sometimes rolls slight on his side, a sign of great trust since it exposes his most vulnerable area, his tummy. His left eye now has some gumminess that Christopher tends to with a cotton swab daily, which Mabel puts up with but definitely does NOT like. When he is taken out of his cage in the mornings, he does much more squeeking and chirping than he did in his younger days. I'm not sure if he's complaining because he has more aches and pains as an old mouse, or he's just a bit more talkative nowadays. It can be quite a funny site listening to him and watching him as he goes on and on.

Our old mother mice, Puddin' and Belle, are showing signs of age, also. Puddin' has had bouts or 'spells' where she appears to be having a seizure, and sits very still and makes funny squeaky cries, and later snaps out of it. Lately, she doesn't seem to have many, thankfully. Belle we suspect may have had a slight stroke, or at least something that affected her balance - she walks slightly wobbly, but still gets around quite well for the most part. A regular daredevil when walking around my shoulders and neck, we watch her closer now so she doesn't take a tumble onto the floor. She's still my cuddlely one, though, and still tickles my ears to heck with her long hair and whiskers!

I have a night job working with physically and mentally disabled adults. A few nights ago I noticed what appeared to be a mouse dropping in the kitchen area and really thought nothing off it as it could have been a bread crumb. There were no real indications of a rodent infestation and previously the site had been cleaned.

Usually during my night shifts at this site I leave a kitchen sink full of soapy water so that if the clients get up in the middle of the night to eat the sink is ready for dirty dishes.

This morning, after leaving a sink full of water, I found the mouse. The poor mouse had gotten into the sink but was not able to get out. The moment I saw her I could not help but cry out, bawling and overwhelmed with remorse. I had a very hard time trying to maintain my composure for the rest of my shift. I drained the sink and gently removed the poor girl and wrapped her up in a paper towel. I discretely placed her in a bag and brought her out of the site to give her a proper burial.

When activities at the site calmed I starting looking around for signs of a nest or other mice. So far I have not found any.

Addendum:All I can say is that I feel responsible.After this experience I went home and spent more time spoiling my mice, especially the old mice.

Awhile back, I came across a real, live mouse circus that actually puts on performances even to this day. I wrote to the owners...

I LOVE your mouse circus! I was thinking it would be a great way to promote understanding of mice, since I meet so many people that have total misunderstandings of mice and rodents in general...

I was wondering if you would mind sharing some of your ideas for building materials for a circus set up? I'm in the United States, and looked at your photos, but am not sure what you were using for many of your props...

Thanks!

Trish LewisFargo, North Dakota

The owners responded...

I'm glad you like our Mouse Circus. It has been going eight years now and provides us with a reasonable income! We go to shows (fairs) festivals etc and the committees pay us so we don't have to charge for entrance. I would suggest that if you want to set up a small mouse circus for promotions, that you get hold of a tray-type arrangement, flat bottom with about 6 inch sides big enough to put some wheels and a few toys into. Put some sort of bedding on the bottom to hide the poo. We use wood shavings but our wood shavings here in Aussie are different to the USA ones. They have been pressed and baled to squeeze out the dust. They don't seem to bale up pine shavings as these are used to animal bedding and I guess this must be the reason. You will need some wheels (the wire ones are the best) and some swing arrangements. My husband Andrew makes all the equipment for the Circus and it's taken years and many thousands of dollars to set up. If you wanted a commercial one you would have to pay us to get the full details!!!!! We have a campervan, a special trailer for the equipment and we keep around 300+ mice. We have a new yellow and red canopy with Aussue flage and twinkling lights. The Circus has a sound system and lights wired in as well so that people get the full package. A small detail - always use female mice for any promotions as the males smell to high heaven and fight! We discovered that early in the piece, they would arrive bleeding for a performance and then proceed to do their "men brawling behind a pub" routine during the performance. In fact we do have a "pub" in the Circus, you may have seen it, the Cat and Rat is made out of a purpose built pot like a broken tea pot and they like to pour out of the spout to the amusement of the spectactors.